katharine ross

[deleted]

Katherine Ross played Mira Hauser, the character who was instrumental in gaining release of the only two passengers allowed to disembark in Cuba. She is the daughter of one of the Jewish couples on the ship, Mr. and Mrs. Hauser (probably not their real names, as many survivors and descendants of those who died in WW II wanted their privacy protected), played by Nehemiah Persoff and Maria Schell. She has preceded her parents to Havana and has been there for some unspecified time, probably a year or more judging from the comments of her parents when she is allowed late in the movie to visit them on the ship for three minutes. While in Cuba she posed as a Christian (hence the cross around her neck during the ship scene), turned to prostitution and "befriended" several high level government officials, including the James Mason character, Cuban Minister of State Remos. The father of two children on the ship, Dr. Strauss, is shown throughout the movie working tirelessly and using lots of money to try to persuade the corrupt Cuban officials to allow the passengers off when the ship arrives, including negotiating fruitlessly with the slimy immigration minister, Manuel Benitez, played by Jose Ferrar. When all else fails, Strauss goes to the whorehouse and asks Mira to intercede on his behalf and get him an appointment with Remos, who was earlier described by the Orson Welles character, Estedes, as one of the few compassionate officials with enough power to help the refugees. Without letting on (out of fear of being discovered to be Jewish in increasingly antisemitic Cuba) that her parents were on the ship, Mira secures an appointment for Strauss with Remos. Strauss tells Remos that he is a pediatrician, arrived in Cuba ahead of his children, and has been living on a meager dole from a Jewish charity. He says he has been volunteering as a physician at a children's clinic because he is not licensed to practice in Cuba. Moved by Strauss's plight and plea, Remos walks him and an armed guard to Benitez's office and demands that Benitez issue visas for the two Strauss children, which Benitez reluctantly does. Then we see the Strauss children being led onto a landing boat and reunited with their father. The scene of Mira visiting her parents, which follows shortly after that, is one of he most poignant of the movie, in my opinion.

Elaine!